David Berkowitz arrested after killing five, terrorizing the city as "Son of Sam."

New York terrorizes itself during another blackout.

George Willig climbs a World Trade Center Tower; he is fined a penny per story.

January 25, 1998

SURVIVINGFISCALRUIN (ANDDISCO)

By CLYDE HABERMAN

N THE 70's, New York hit bottom.

Not that it stayed there for long. The city has always been too skilled at reinventing itself not to bounce back from hard times. But by the mid-70's, only an irredeemable optimist could keep the gremlins at bay, the ones
that stalked the soul in the dead of night. Could it be, they hissed, that New York had finally had it?

Neal Boenzi/The New York Times

GRAFFITI IN THE subways became a divisive issue: to some it was urban folk art; to others, the end of civilization.

There were so many reasons to answer yes, none more compelling than the discovery in 1974 that the city was broke.

A history of fiscal irresponsibility had finally caught up with it -- decades of doing nothing to stop the mass exodus of middle-class taxpayers or the wild spending on social services that could not possibly be afforded or City
Hall's addiction to dubious fiscal gimmicks to keep itself afloat.

In 1974, the house of cards collapsed when banks refused to lend New York any more money. Bankruptcy loomed. The city had no choice but to swallow its pride and ask the Federal Government for a bailout, only to suffer the humiliation
of having President Gerald R. Ford tell it to take a hike.

Eventually, the White House came through with Federal loan guarantees that enabled New York to get past the immediate crisis. But the initial rejection still stung. It had been been seared into the municipal consciousness by a
1975 headline in The Daily News that became an instant classic:

Lamentably, in the eighth decade of a unified New York, the rot went well beyond the local treasury. It ate into the very fabric of city life. Sure, there were periods when crime rates were higher and decades, like the 30's, when unemployment was
a plague. But it is hard to think of times when New Yorkers felt as bad about themselves as they did in the 70's.

This was a decade when they learned about systemic police corruption and when Frank Serpico became a household name. It was a heart-of-darkness decade, the decade of the deranged killer known as Son of Sam. Terrorist bombings spread
death in Manhattan and at La Guardia Airport, endless fires consumed the Bronx, and widespread looting accompanied a 1977 blackout, erasing memories of the we're-all-brothers sweetness that had marked the last big power
failure, in 1965.

Longtime New Yorkers sensed their beloved city spinning out of control. Crime soared, and every other week seemed to bring a municipal strike. Garbage collectors walked out. So did doctors at city hospitals. In January 1971, the
police went on strike for a few days, an action that was unheard of, not to mention illegal. Fortunately, temperatures hovered near zero the whole time. Even the muggers stayed home -- that's how cold it was. Crime actually
went down while the cops were out.

The collapse of the old order was already detectable in the late 60's, only it did not feel so ominous, despite destructive episodes like a 1968 student strike at Columbia University. Change was taking place at every level.

I will never forget my shock on returning to New York in 1970 after two years in the Army, mostly in Europe.

Paul Hosefros/The New York Times

THE GAME WENT ON as a building on 101st Street at First Avenue burned in 1975, part of a wave of blazes.

The beards, long hair, flamboyant clothes and foul language that used to be associated primarily with hippies and leftist rebels had gone mainstream. Even stockbrokers were dressing and talking like that.

Though odd, these stylistic innovations were not threatening. Other breaks from the past were merely wacky or giddy. Some were even hopeful. The once-hapless Mets did not just have a good team in 1969, their eighth year of existence.
They won the World Series. Impossible! As impossible as a man walking on the moon, which, of course, also occurred in 1969.

As for local politics, what could be more screwy than two big-time writers running for high office: Norman Mailer for mayor and Jimmy Breslin for City Council president. Sure, they lost, which was probably just as well. But how
could you not like a political campaign that ended with a candidate, Mr. Breslin, apologizing for having taken an active part in a process that closed the bars for a day?

The problem was there was so much change. It came so fast and so hard. And a lot of it was ugly. Even a city with infinite endurance could buckle, which is exactly what happened as the 70's wore grimly on.

New York almost gave up on itself. Brigades of businesses fled to the suburbs or left the region entirely, turning their backs on the city that had nurtured them.

Nothing of consequence ever seemed to get built in those days, and existing structures were being defiled by graffiti vandals. True, the World Trade Center was completed in the early 70's. But it was hardly the city's
most glorious skyscraper and, besides, it had been planned long before.

Everywhere you turned, naysayers abounded. A new road was needed to replace the crumbling West Side Highway. Not a chance. Environmentalists blocked the project at every turn. It was almost as if the city had lost the ability to
dream grandly, a failing that went beyond architecture. We had gone from the Champagne sophistication of Cole Porter in grandfather's day to the disco exhortations of the Bee Gees: uh
uh uh uh stayin' alive. This was progress?

Then again, staying alive was the most many New Yorkers could think about. Broadway acknowledged as much when it moved up the evening curtain by an hour, to 7:30, so that tourists and suburbanites could make a clean getaway before
the night stalkers filled Times Square.

AVING said all this, let's be careful not to paint too depressing a picture. The second half of the 70's brought glimmers of hope for a city destined
to rebound. The Broadway musical, which was ready to receive last rites, got a reprieve with "A Chorus Line." The long-dormant Yankees roared back. Operation Sail, a bicentennial spectacle of tall ships, lifted New
York spirits. And in 1977, a new mayor was elected, one Ed Koch. He was certainly not fault-free. But he brought pizazz to a City Hall that had limped along under the colorless Abe Beame.

Even better, New York had the last laugh on Washington. The Democrats held their 1976 national convention at Madison Square Garden and went from that New York springboard to the White House. In the end, it was President Ford who
was told by the voters to drop dead.